Tuesday, July 2, 2013

Family History: Did You Google™ It?

With a run on all the possibilities for pushing your family
history research into the next frontier, how could I not spend some time discussing Google™?!

Actually, make that not one day, but two.

Google is too monstrous to address with one mere blog post.
It is like the air researchers breathe—so ubiquitous we take it for granted.
Until it gets taken away.

Today, let’s focus on a mini-smorgasbord of how Google™ helps
bring our research forward. Tomorrow, we’ll get into the meat of the matter:
Google Plus.

Search

Of course, the first thing that comes to mind for most
people when they hear the term “Google” is the search capability. Anyone with a
handheld device with Internet connectivity has learned to transform problem
solving scenarios with one additional step: take the question to Google™.

You can do exactly that with your genealogical research.
Simple steps like putting quote marks around specific terms you wish to isolate
(like “John Fitzgerald Kennedy” and “Dallas,
Texas”) will help eliminate false
leads. But that is only a start. You can add more details through the advanced search page.

And don’t forget that Google™ is actually the proud owner of
YouTube—another resource for searching out those genealogy materials.

Find

For those of you who are visually oriented, try using Google™
Maps to scope out distances your ancestors traveled from one census location to
another. For the more recent census records which include site addresses for
your relatives’ residences, Google™ Maps “Street View” can assist you in
determining whether the house they lived in might still be standing.

Before I realized I could get that assistance from Google™
Maps, my husband and I had actually mapped a route through Fort Wayne to
determine the proximity of his ancestors’ homes to each other—and discovered
some addresses were merely empty lots full of weeds and others now sported
recently rebuilt residences. (Worse, in another trip to research Chicago ancestors, we had
ended up in neighborhoods which vanished and were replaced by endless
warehouses).

Street View allows you to get a glimpse of what the area now
looks like. From that, you can determine the possibility of whether your family’s
former home is still standing—and if it is, what it might look like.

Just as Google™ Maps allows you the visual experience of
locating ancestors’ former homes and properties, Google™ Alerts can lead you to
the words others may have written about a particular person or subject. By
entering the terms you wish to receive “alerts” for, you will be notified
within a short time after the Google™ trawler stumbles upon the search term for
which you have indicated interest.

It bugged me so much that I went to Google™ Alerts and
entered the search parameters I wished to receive notifications on.

When the letters finally were returned to descendants of the
intended recipients, I received a Google™ Alert on the news story within two
hours after it was posted online.

That same service—free, incidentally—can tip you off about
recent developments regarding any search term you’ve been seeking.

Share

For those who appreciate the benefits of collaboration, Google™
is again right there, ready to help.

If you wish to set aside a separate email address for your
work with others on a specific project, you can set up a gmail account, free of
charge. Sometimes, that helps manage a project without having to divulge an
email account you use for personal reasons or work purposes. You can even
earmark it so it is readily recognizable for everyone involved in your research
project. For instance, when I set up A
Family Tapestry (on Blogspot, another Google™ product, by the way), I
established a gmail address specifically for the blog. Predictably, the address
is afamilytapestry (at) gmail (dot) com—something easily remembered by those
who need to drop me a line.

For those who appreciate the benefits of Google™ Drive, it
also enables usage of Google™ Docs—a way to collaborate on documents for those
working on group research projects. Our genealogy society found this useful
when revamping our organization’s bylaws, but it can also be used by family
history researchers working on common goals.

Of course, the prime way to share with Google™ is on Google™
Plus—an idea large enough to call for a post of its own, which we will tackle
tomorrow.

Hmmmmm...Google Plus. Well, as I'm not really satisfied with the way I've utilized Google Plus so far, you'll see there is a lot more potentially to be said on that topic. Sometimes, I'm really overwhelmed with these digital riches. Think I need to sit down and strategize how to manage the time and effort devoted to all the possibilities. Gotta have a plan...

Thank you for all these tips -- nice and comprehensive. I copied the URL for googling blogs. I've used Google for Books, Maps, and history (often it takes me to wikipedia), but I did not know about these other functions. Research is endless! But that's a good thing.

About Me

It is my contention that, after a lifetime, one of the greatest needs people have is to be remembered. They want to know: have I made a difference?
I write because I can't keep for myself the gifts others have entrusted to me. Through what I've already been given--though not forgetting those to whom I must pass this along--from family I receive my heritage; through family I leave a legacy. With family I weave a tapestry. These are my strands.